


Je t'aime

by theHistoriangirl



Category: City of Love: Paris (Visual Novel)
Genre: Declaration of Love, F/M, Final season 1, Goodbyes, Kissing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-08-29
Packaged: 2021-03-07 02:46:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,240
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26169658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theHistoriangirl/pseuds/theHistoriangirl
Summary: After Raphael throwing away the essence to petition of Adeline [MC], both have to talk about their feelings and relationship.
Relationships: Raphael Laurent/Main Character (City of Love: Paris)
Kudos: 2





	Je t'aime

A week had passed since Adeline had saved Paris. In the news, only a glimpse of the enormous odissey she passed went by. Although, fortunately, she didn’t do it alone. However, she had no idea what to do next since everything was done: Vincent in jail, Paris safe and the essence…

She stopped for a moment. Adeline was sitting on her bed like a ball, while Kat worked on her thesis advances in the living room. A pile of papers was scattered on the bedspread, some copies of her articles for City of Love, a few postcards she was planning to send to her parents and American friends around the Unites. Even some pieces of Raphael’s research on Héloïse’s riddle that talked about the supposed location of the essence were there, like guilty memories. 

He even bothers to give her a transcript of the last letter that was originally written in Latin. It had a coffee-strained edge and was slightly wrinkled on one side of the sheet. Raphael’s hasty, elongated, joint letter filling almost the entire space. Annotations were in the margins, with much smaller and illegible handwriting. 

She assumed that his plan hadn’t worked out as planned in the end. Raphael wanted the essence to help people dealing with their emotions, but he had ended up destroying it, throwing it into the Seine because… because…

Adeline closed her eyes and tightened the bridge of her nose with her fingers. She didn’t want to think about it. On the other hand, she felt guilty and fascinated at the same time. A man like her boss has his principles well established since she had met him, who knows how much it took him to come up with his plan about the essence anyway. Maybe months, or even more. 

And the thought that he had put them aside because she  _ asked him to  _ make a couple of questions gnaw at her mind every time she remembered it. 

She hadn’t returned to  _ City of Love _ since his mission was complete. First, he had to arrange some things with her residence permit, and then she just didn’t want to. She knew very well that the magazine’s offices must have been a mess. After Raphael’s share sale under suspicious circumstances, after having changed to Karm International and then having a boss like Marion Valette, to finally return to Monsieur Laurent’s domain overnight… Just so that the Frenchman in charge was totally incapable of running the company as he was, drugged by the essence, he probably needed a hand. 

That made her want to come back, but then she imagined that she would have to meet him and that he would want to talk. And then what? 

He would like to clarify things, but Adeline didn’t have anything clear. 

She knew the diverse paths that were presented before her, Adeline could easily follow any of them with total freedom but was terrified to choose wrongly. 

She could stay in Paris, forget that the search for the essence ever happened, think that when she saw some magazines stand near Montmartre with the logo of City of Love, that she had a good time in that company, but that now was over and she was in a different place, working for someone else. 

She could leave. She still had a juicy job offer in London, and TJ even has offered her to return to the United States with him. 

Adeline sighed and ran a hand over her face. This was tiring. Not knowing what to do was leaving her with sleepless nights tossing and turning, hearing the sweet purring of her cat. 

She looked out his tiny window at the quiet street below. It was too early for tourist to start their tours. Above, one could see the main dome of the Sacré Coeur, whitish with the morning sun beating down on the stone. 

Paris was a cosmopolitan city, nothing like the Phoenix in which she grew up her entire life. Here, she could walk its wide boulevards and meet people from practically all over the world speaking dozens of different languages. 

She has walked from such popular and touristic places like the Champs Elysées to the heart of the not-so-perfect city, Belleville. But if she thought about it hard, if she closed her eyes and imagined going to the airport with a couple of suitcases to leaving everything behind, her chest hurt. 

Adeline risked her life for this city. 

Looking at the things that were scattered on her bed, the City of Love articles were powerfully appealing to her. She had made great friends there, too. She remembered her angry boss, Louise, like a rock in the middle of a sea storm. The sweet and eccentric Leo, who later invited her to his poetry club and to take long strolls in Buttes-Chaumont to drink tea and eat cakes near the neighborhood. 

She took in a folder all the notes she had taken from Raphael’s house when he was under the influence of the essence and with a sigh, placed them inside. Then she put her own notes and other things in other piles. A postcard of the Arc de Triomphe tempted her.

She stood up on her bed and started writing on the back of it. This was for her parents, along with the one of the Opéra Garnier. Both places where she had to meet the two nemeses: Raphael Laurent, in a hurried, crowded bar. An abnormal meeting. And Vincent Karm, in a private function of  _ Fausto,  _ all luxuries and secrets. 

“Where are you going?”, Kar asked her just above his laptop screen. 

“I have to give this back”, Adeline answered, lifting the folder and putting a thin sweater over the blue blouse she was wearing. The air was cold from time to time, ans she also put her on a pair of low, black shoes. “I’ll be back soon.”

_ Or maybe not.  _

She really didn’t know. 

“Take as long as you want, I’ll be here until ten. Then I’m going to the library to meet other colleagues”. The girl’s brown eyes went dark. “Should I be worried?”

“No”, Adeline muttered. “I can’t leave Paris.”

Kat smiled at her. “That happens to most people. Once Paris hugs you, you never want to let her go.”

Adeline looked at her feet. “I’m going to leave now.” She opened the door and stopped before flying off and kissing the cheek of her friend where she has sitting crossed-legged. “Take care.”

“Same!”, she heard the answer as she closed the door. 

  
  


Adeline made her way on foot and métro because this way she could clear her ideas and spend time to tranquilize. She was seeing the Quais de Seine, with Notre Dame shaping up huge and old in the middle of the Île de la Cité. 

On the other side was her final destination: the City of Love’s offices. And what only separated them was a bridge.

Adeline took a deep breath and pressed the folder to her chest, then closed her eyes a few blinks and finally continued to move steadily forward. 

Despite the time she was being away, about three weeks or so, there wasn’t much difference. 

Louise’s cubicle was empty, and some of the columnists were fired when Marion was in charge, but Raphael’ secretary was the same. Adeline smiled at her meanwhile she was closer the her desk. 

“Hello, Adeline. I’m glad you came! The boss has been asking about you.”

She felt her heart beat faster. “Why? Is it something… bad?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think so! I mean, he just asks if you’re here, or if you came for your stuff. I think he wants to know if you’re still in town.”

_ He wants to know if you’re still here.  _

Adeline swallowed. “Can I see him?”

“Yes, come in. He has a meeting in two hours, but now he’s free.”

That could be good or very bad. “Thank you, Noah. It won’t take so long.”

The secretary shrugged and waved to her, giving Adeline permission to enter. 

Adeline’s shoes echoed against the floor as she walked down the short corridor separating the secretary from Raphael’s office. The door was closed and the handle was silent when she turned it. 

Inside, the office was bright with the white morning light. As messy as ever, a couple of relics from the Middle Ages were in display among tables, boxes and even the floor. As Adeline breathed, the smell of paper and old library like material hit her with a hint of black coffee. 

She looked around the perimeter and took a few seconds to locate it. He was sitting in a reclining chair with his back facing the door holding a book, the only sign of his presence was the brown hair shining against the light. 

“Knock, knock”, she said, although she was so nervous that her voice could have come out like a whisper. “Raphael?”

She took a step forward, wondered absently what was that book that could absorb him that much. Or if he was like that with everything. Adeline saw the surface of a table covered with at least for cups of coffee and a pair of the magazine’s recent number and then she had the desperate impulse of leaving the papers on that table and going away as if she never was there. 

What if Raphael didn’t want to see her?

A pile of books against the table made her trip over the table. She cursed when the volumes began to fall hopelessly on her feet. The noise was enough to drive Raphael out of his self-absorption. He looked with a very angry frown at the focus of the noise. 

Then he saw her. 

The scowl born between his eyebrows disappeared and his blue eyes opened in surprise. 

“Adeline?”, he exclaimed and left the book on the chair when he got up from it and advanced only a few steps. Thinking like a better idea, he stopped and stayed on the other side of the table full of cups. “I thought that… I thought… that… you were…  _ gone.” _

Adeline looked at him for a moment before turning her eyer to her shoes. 

“I was going to”, she confessed. “But I have found myself unable to leave this city behind.”

“What brings you here?”

“I work here, Raphael”. Well, she used to. 

“I thought you told me Marion fired you”. He shrugged, leaning against the table. “I thought that after what happened you wouldn’t want to come back here.”

“I don’t want you to think that this place brings me back bad memories, Raphael”. She approached the table, barely touching it. For the difference of height, she has to raise her head straight into his eyes. “Because it’s the opposite.”

The folder slid on the table, meanwhile, Adeline was pushing away the coffee cups. “Here, I took this from your house when you were… hum,  _ indisposed.”  _ The other took it with a light scowl and leafed through it. “They are copies of Héloïse’s letter and other resources, such as maps. It didn’t help much in the end, but it was a big step. Thank you, Raphael.”

“You just came to give me this?”

“No”, Adeline replied, making one of her hand a fist and placing it discreetly under her sweater. This was difficult. “I came to apologize.”

Raphael cut it off. “What are you talking about?”

“I know you wanted to use the essence to help people, and in the end I manipulated you to get rid of it. I’m sorry, Raphael. At the time I thought it was for the best, but, what if it wasn’t? What if this was an irreparable mistake? I’m sorry for ruining your plans and make your efforts into nothing, Raphael. I’m truly sorry.”

She sat on the edge of a padded chair, looking at the floor and waiting for the verdict.

“I don’t think you have to apologize for following your ideals, Adeline.” Raphael took his chair and put it near the table, sitting on it. “I don’t think you made a mistake. Actually, I’m the one who should be thanking you.”

She tilted her head.

“Why should you?”

“I couldn’t have gotten where I am today if it wasn’t for your help. And I wouldn’t have lived what I did with you either.” He took a sheet of paper and slid it to her. “That’s yours, keep it.”

Adeline leaned to see it. It was the transcript of Héloïse’s last letter to her husband, then already dead, Pierre Ábelard.

She looked at him. “I have the original. It’s the least I can give you.”

One thing that is truly significant. Adeline took the paper and felt it between her fingers. For a few moments, the only sound around them was the crunching of the paper being squeezed. 

“It’s my favorite letter of the two of them”, Raphael said suddenly. Adeline looked at him with intensity but in silence. He cleared his throat. “Héloïse told him the secret of the essence and proclaimed her eternal love in that letter even though she knew that Pierre would never be able to read it. For me, it means a lot.”

Adeline bent over him, without thinking. It was like a reflex. 

“Many times that’s what a goodbye or a break-up, whatever you want to call it, means. Only one of the two parts have the last word, only one of the two will be able to say goodbye.” Raphael said it in a still, soft voice. His blue eyes shone against Adeline’s gaze, who felt a sudden lump in her throat. “And then, nothing. I think you should take advantage of that last time as best as you can. And what do you think, Adeline?”

When she respond, she had the courage to look him in the eyes, even when her voice came out just a little louder than a whisper:

“I don’t like goodbyes.”

“So this isn’t goodbye?”

Adeline bit her lip. Was it? She didn’t even know. But she was convinced of something. 

“I don’t want to say goodbye to you, Raphael.”

The blue look of the Frenchman softened. “Dou you want me to tell you a secret, Adeline?”

She nodded, barely. 

“When you told me to throw away the essence of love, I was going to say no.” He leaned over to where she was as if to touch her. “But I couldn’t. And I was scared because I knew that you were going completely against what I wanted to do, against my principles. But I couldn’t because I didn’t want to disappoint you.”

“I…”

“And that’s not all. After I did it I thought I was going to feel terrible, drowned with regret for my decision. But I didn’t. And you know why?”

“No”, she mumbled, though no answer was really unnecessary. 

“Because I did it and then you looked at me in such a way…”, he sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t even know how to describe it. But I thought I could do anything if you looked at me like that again.”

Adeline felt the blush climb up her skin, from her cheeks to her neck. 

“Raph…”

“I know what you’ll say, Adeline.” He said in a low, sorrowful voice. “That it’s silly.”

“No! I wasn’t going to say that.” She raised a hand that was inches away from his face. “You don’t need to do anything to make me see you in that way, Raphael.” Adeline swallowed the enormous nervousness that was growing inside her stomach like a vine. “I had seen you like that before.”

It wasn’t something she liked to admit out loud, because it was one thing to fall in love with someone closer to her, and quite another to have fallen in love with her boss…

Raphael looked at her without being able to hide his amazement. 

“Are you serious?”

“Yes, I am very serious.” On an impulse, he put one of her hands through the wood of the desk and put it with her palm up, looking at him with a smile. “And what do you say?”

He looked at her hand for a moment, without making any movement. Then, slowly, he muttered:

“I-I’m not sure…” Adeline blinked. “It’s not that I’m not sure how I feel! I don’t want you to think that it’s just that I… I don’t want to ruin it. You know better that anyone the problems I have in… in… in establishing a relationship.

“Raphael”, she called him. Staring in his eyes with determination. “If you don’t try, you’re going to fail forever. If you don’t try you won’t know. That time at Pont Alexandre you managed it very well without the essence.”

“Adeline, I don’t want something bad to happen and you end up hating me.”

She rolled her eyes just like Kat did when she said her something stupid, and with a finger touched the tip of his nose. 

“I will not. But honestly, don’t you think this is worth the risk? I like you, Raphael. I probably love you. Just as you are, I don’t think you have to take the essence to say o do romantic things. Romance isn’t just that, huh?

“I know, now, I know.”

Adeline recalled the three eternal weeks she spent caring for a Raphael delirious with love for her. This time, she did laugh. 

“Please don’t do that again.”

Raphael blushed. “I won’t.” He observed her, extending a hand towards her, which Adeline took, her fingers intertwined with his, which she squeezed tightly as if he didn’t want to let her go. “Then… Adeline, would you like to be my girlfriend?”

“Monsieur Laurent, you’re in luck today.” She laughed and nodded. Adeline didn’t let go his hand as she got up from her seat and walked across the table to him. 

Raphael looked every step, with a smile growing on his lips. He stood up as soon as he saw her intentions, squeezing his grip on her, and looked at her with bright eyes.

“Adeline”, he called her when they were face to face, of course, she had to raise her head to look at him. “I want to make something clear to you.”

She blinked and looked at him nibbling on her lower lip, as she always did when she was anxious. “Hmmm?”

The Frenchman took her cheeks in his hand and leaned so close to Adeline that she felt the warmth radiating from his skin. 

“I’m totally in love with you.” He said, and then finally ended the distance between them, barely caressing their lips together. It was more the promise of a kiss than a real one. ”Could you be my Héloïse?”

“That’s so cheesy!”Adeline smiled against him, smelling his essence of coffee, books and lotion. “Of course I can.”

She had her hands on Raphael’ shoulders and felt them move back and forth when he laughed. Then he told her something in a short, fast French that she couldn’t understand, but she was distracted as he wrapped one arm around her waist and the other hand caressed her cheek. 

This time it was Adeline who kissed him, with a real, intense kiss. She held on to him as Raphael held onto her, illuminated by the morning light and the promise of a great day and the beginning of many, many more. 

  
  


  
  
  



End file.
